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Robert Hunter Live at West Hartford Ballroom on 1986-10-05

by Robert Hunter

Publication date: 1986-10-05 ( check for other copies)

Topics: Live concert

Collection: RobertHunter

Band/Artist: Robert Hunter

Item Size: 505.4M

Robert Hunter

October 5, 1986

West Hartford Ballroom,

West Hartford, CT

(formerly The Agora Ballroom)

Bill was Max Creek, Robert Hunter & Go Ahead

Source: Alan Bershaw’s SBD Master Cassettes (TDK HX-S 90s)

Lineage: SBD > snake back to the stage > Nakamichi 550 (No Dolby on TDK HX-S 90s) Master Cassettes > (Nakamichi Dragon playback) > Lexicon Lambda > Logic > Wav 16/44.1 > xAct (sbe correction) > FLAC

Tracklist: 69:58

01 //Jack Straw

02 Friend Of The Devil

03 Rock Columbia

04 tuning/banter

05 Brown Eyed Women

06 Alabama Getaway

07 tuning/banter

08 Easy Wind->

09 Mr. Charlie->

10 Easy Wind (reprise)

11 UCONN Huskies Fight Song

12 Aim At The Heart

13 Rueban And Cherise

14 tuning/banter

15 //Promontory Rider

16 Touch Of Grey

17 encore applause

18 Box Of Rain

19 Ripple

20 Boys In The Barroom

Robert Hunter - vocals, acoustic guitar

Notes: These Max Creek, Robert Hunter & Go Ahead recordings have circulated from cassette copies that I made for several friends shortly afterwards and all circulating board tapes of this night trace back to my stealth board recordings mastered on my Nakamichi 550.

Somewhat shameful story about how I accomplished recording these sets and why the Hunter and Go Ahead sets both start in progress during the first songs. I was a stage hand at The Agora back then and after his soundcheck, I asked Hunter if I could record. I had mixed for him several times before this and ran monitors for him two additional times. He remembered me and graciously said yes, but when I went to the house console to patch in, Harry Popick said in no uncertain terms - absolutely not!

So... with the help of another crew member who shall remain nameless, during the Max Creek opener set, we took two channels not being used on the snake and patched into an auxiliary output from the house console. I patched my Nak 550 into the other end of the snake back on stage and hid the deck inside a road case. I spent the entire night sitting on that road case watching the show onstage. Harry was mixing monitors about 5 feet from me the entire time, so I had to be careful when starting and flipping tapes. This explains why I waited a minute or two to start the recordings, as I had to make sure he was distracted. And one of the humorous things about this endeavor was that Harry was very friendly during the show, handing me many Heinekens, while I sat there on that road case. He may have mistook me for his personal stage security, ha!

Also of note is that during Hunter's set, he sang The UCONN Huskies Fight Song, as he was an alumni. Prior to the show, we chatted briefly about that, which is possibly what provoked him to whip that out.

The masters were unintentionally recorded without dolby, as I was fumbling around in the dark and never noticed the button wasn't engaged. I was only able to monitor levels when initially getting it rolling during Max Creek's set, so it was a "set it and forget it" situation on levels. Thankfully, they remained good throughout the night and I was using TDK HX-S blanks, which were a particularly great tape stock that could take a lot of saturation without distorting. That's the scoop. I rarely ever recorded stealth and this was one of very few times I ever attempted going stealth direct from the soundboard. I officially apologize Harry and hope enough time has gone by that I'll be forgiven.

This is the first digital transfer of the master cassettes and these files are new to circulation. -Alan Bershaw (April 2021)